Ammunition shelf life - shotgun vs centerfire vs rimfire?

rt014

rt014

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Jun 21, 2001
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My impressions from either anecdotal remarks or reading previous threads is that centerfire ammunition if properly stored in a cool dry place is relatively free from degradation. Second in order of susceptability to degradation would be rimfires (I would guess)? And the most likely to degrade would be shotgun ammunition because it doesn't appear to be as airtight as the other two.

Am I on the right track with this reasoning?

Thanks
 
Gov't ammo is considered to have a shelf life of 20 years. Stored properly in a cool dry place it will last longer. I don't know of differences between the different types of ammo.Premium and military ammo usually has a sealant around the primer and bullet to keep out moisture .
 
There's still ammunition around that's been stockpiled for 50 years and more and it still works -- often doesn't seem to be 100% reliable, but maybe it wasn't in the first place, who knows....

Shotshells that old would have paper shells and I don't recall any stories of people trying very old shotshells. Modern shotshells are plastic (the thin brass base on modern shotshells is purely decorative). Most (all?) plastics dry out and deteriorate after twenty or thirty years....

I've heard of reloaders using canister powder that had been stored for decades with no problem. If it gets wet it can get moldy, but if it's in a tightly capped container it keeps.
 
Well, I've fired 30-'06 ammunition from World War I if that counts. A friend of mine had a large container of this stuff, and he gave it to me. (I think I have some around here still). I fired it with my bolt action 30-'06, and there were no problems.

The ammunition was kept in a cool dry place for all of this time. The stuff looked like the day it was made except the obvious tarnish.

Bob
 
Depends on storage conditions, I shoot lots of 30 cal. ammo with a head stamp date of 42or 43 it works great! Rimfire hold up very well also. George
 
Moisture is an enemy here. Because of long term storage requirements, military ammunition usually has a sealant round all the openings in the case (primer pocket and case mouth). Commercial ammunition might but, probably doesn't in most cases.

Next, keep it away from heat and direct sunshine.

When you start talking about ammunition made before World War 2, failures to fire are most apt to be primer related. A lot of the older corrosive primers were very good and reliable for long periods of time. Initially, non-corrosive primers weren't as good but, like all things in life, they have gotten much better over time.

That pretty much covers centerfire ammunition. Shotgun shells, those vary way too much to draw specific conclusions as a class of ammunition. Old paper shells are collector items these days and not functional ammunition. Some of the military brass cased ammunition will probably be good decades from now and is very similar to centerfire military ammunition. Plastic shotgun shells will have a good shelf life if stored out of the heat, sunlight, and moisture. Plastic cases degrade at varying rates depending on composition of the plastic and the condition in storage so, there is a wide range of shelf life here.

22 rimfire? Generally, a year or two but, you have so many factors here with exposed lead projectiles, primer differences, case mouth sealant, etc. In general, this stuff gets pretty unreliable after a couple of years unless you have taken the time to store in properly. Most rimfire ammunition is cheap so, no effort at proper storage is generally made. Could you find good rimfire ammunition that's been stored for 2 decades that fires reliably? Sure, but that isn't likely to happen. After all, when was the last time you put a brick of 22lr in an air tight ammo can with a good desicant bag and then stored somewhere cool?
 
I have fired well "preserved" paper shotshells from the '30s-'50s and have yet to have a dud. Actually, quite the contrary, patterns were tighter and ranges greater with vintage ammo than the new stuff. I've fired plenty of WWII vintage .45 ACP recently and never had a problem. I think that as long as it's well kept (cool and dry)the stuff probably has an "indefinite" shelf life. I know of an incident where someone recovered a 5 inch shell (from an offshore wreck) that went "boom" when some idiot tried to remove the projectile with an acetylene torch. They were sitting on the bottom of the Atlantic for nearly 50 years!:rolleyes:
 
I stupidly fired some very old 0.32 S&W special ammo with no problems. Turns out when I took the two remaining bullets to get "some more" I found it was some sort of collector's item now. Sure enough I can't find it anywhere. Just as well, the revolver cylinder has a crack in it.

I also fired some pretty ancient looking 9mm through my glock -- but it couldn;t have actually been very old now, could it.
 
Originally posted by fracmeister
I also fired some pretty ancient looking 9mm through my glock -- but it couldn;t have actually been very old now, could it.
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I dunno. Could it? 9mm Parabellum (9x19)has been around since the early 1900's, say somewhere around 1904 to 1908. Why couldn't it have been very old?
 
I thought we were talking much later that the 9mm became widespread in fmj -- i guess i left that out -- but I could be wrong on it for sure. Either way this was a foreign manufacture and at the bottom of some crates. Badly stored and I had to caliper them before I;d load them up. Not for the old Tec-9, that's for sure.
 
The '08 Luger Parabellum was the first gun to use the 9mm Parabellum cartridge. The cartridge was popular over most of the world from its invention, though not in the US until recently. Almost all ammunition for autoloaders was round nose full jacket until the sixties when people finally figured out how to make other kinds of bullet feed reliably. (S&W tried putting just a cap on the nose instead of a full jacket but it didn't work very well.)

I've used .22 ammo that was sitting around for years, even a decade or two, and never had a misfire. It was all major brands. The .22 case is thinner so it could get badly corroded a little sooner, maybe, but as long as it isn't corroded to the point of roughness I wouldn't worry about it. Lead bullets don't need sealant, and the rimfire primer doesn't need sealant, so what's to go wrong?

As Fracmeister already mentioned, some people collect old cartridges. I'm saving some old ammunition I have that's no longer made -- it isn't worth much in terms of money and may never be, but I think it's interesting so I'm keeping it. I have some of the original .22 Stingers with the pentagon hollowpoint and I'm saving that for werewolf defense. :cool:
 
Paper shotgun shells? It's certainly possible but, all I have seen were subject to moisture damage.

22lr stored for decades? Again it's certainly possible but, considering some of the new stuff doesn't fire, storage for a long period would not help much.

With everything, good storage and good components make a difference.

Will that new box of Golden Sabre's (or Gold Dots or, whatever wonder bullet) you just bought still fire 5 years from now as they age in the old wheelgun? Sure (assuming the pistol isn't rusted beyond belief).
 
You should use some care with old ammunition. The surplus military ammo from WW 1 and at least some of WW 2 used corrosive primers (fulminate of Mercury) that can deteroriate chambers and barrels. I have not heard of old ammo not firing, though.

I have forgotten the year they stopped using the old primers-getting old sucks.
 
I know a bit about knives, but quite a bit more about firearms...

Enfield .303 ammo from the 1920's will fire, if it was stored properly over the years, as will Mauser ammo from the same period...

.30 cal and .45 ACP from WWII works fine too, when you can find it, and if it was stored properly...

'Nam era ammo works great, same conditions apply...

I've shot lots of shotgun ammo that was 20 years old with no problem, and some .22 as well...

As was said before, the primer seems to be the key here...and if it's gotten wet, or corroded, then all bets are off...

Not that it needs to be said here...but, if you're using a weapon for defense, fire hundreds of rounds through it to find out what brand/shape/weight works best for you and your gun...then, buy a case of that 'best' ammo, and repeat step #1, just to be sure...

Once you've fired a few hundred rounds through it, and have a few hundred more left, you can continue to practice on a semi regular basis, for just a few bucks...

Old ammo; fun to plink with if in good condition, but not as reliable as quality new...

As always, YMMV ;)

Mel
 
Just to nitpick, mercury primers and corrosive primers are different. The problem with mercury primers was the mercury residue would amalgamate with the brass, and brass amalgamated with mercury is not suitable for reloading. Mercury primers were abandoned in the late 1800s, replaced by corrosive primers, which corrode the barrel unless the residue is washed off with water or other suitable solvent (not oil; it doesn't dissolve in oil).

Noncorrosive primers were universal in civilian ammo well before WWII, but hadn't yet been developed enough to satisfy the military. All WWII era military surplus ammo has corrosive primers, and some countries continued to use corrosive primers long after WWII. It won't harm your gun if you clean it off with water or bore solvent before it can cause corrosion. Whether the saving in cost is worth the trouble is a matter of personal choice.

The cheapest .22 ammo is not 100% reliable even when it's new, and might well get worse with age for all I know -- I don't use the stuff.

I"m fortunate to live ten minutes from Jurek Brothers -- they have a website now, too: http://www.jurekbrothers.com/ I'm all in favor of cheap practice ammo, but the Jurek Brothers have Winchester .22 ammo and all kinds of reloading supplies at prices so low I'm not even tempted by the cheap stuff. :cool:
 
Depending on where you live, good quality ammunition may not be plentiful or cheap. That's where I tend run into the situation discussed here.

In Texas, the "good stuff" was only marginally more expensive then the "other stuff". Now, the "other stuff" is expensive and the "good stuff" is cost prohibitive for most use. My how times change as we move away from the promised land.......
 
Originally posted by Sid Post
...snip...22lr stored for decades? Again it's certainly possible but, considering some of the new stuff doesn't fire, storage for a long period would not help much.

...snip...
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I fire 15-20 year old .22rf with NO problems at all - Old Remington Standard Velocity. The Remington High Vels I have at home are about a decade old - no problem. You store them at room temp, room humidity, in original packing and they just work - I'll go through brick after brick with no misfires. I'm down to my last 1000 of the Std Vel now
 
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